Clouseau

So God decided on a 120 years elapsed period ('grace period', if that is the meaning) when Noah was 480 y-o.

Ray Moscow

It's a break in the narrative chronology of a least 20 years backwards, assuming that there is a coherent chronolgy to the account.

I think Dean's explanation -- which is based on a summary of some indepth analysis of the texts -- makes a lot more sense.

ksen

I started a thread in BC&H about this question.

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.p...16#post4855116

I'm hoping we get some more scholarly input over there (not that there hasn't been any on this thread it's just that I don't believe many of the BC&H regulars visit GRD that often).

Clouseau

There can't be a backwards break- only forwards. There is concurrence only.

And all this is taking the 'narrative' literally anyway.

funinspace

The Jews liked number themes like many ancient cultures. The ancient numeral systems of the area were often base-60 and used base 6 and 10 quite a bit. 120 happens to be a nice fit for all the numeral systems and the top high end of human age. I would suggest that this is the most likely source for the 120, and explaining why the fairy tales of long lived people in the past didn't happen any more.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babylonian_numerals
The Babylonians, who were famous for their astrological observations and calculations (aided by their invention of the abacus), used a sexagesimal (base-60) positional numeral system inherited from the Sumerian and also Akkadian civilizations. Neither of the predecessors was a positional system (having a convention for which ‘end’ of the numeral represented the units).

I'll let others debate the context of periods vs. human life span.

seebs

I can't imagine a series of circumstances under which I would consider the number in question to be precise or binding. I doubt it means much of anything.